pet-friendly shelter project

The Project

Since the inception of Parachutes for Pets we've had the goal of opening a pet friendly shelter in Calgary. Currently there are no community shelters in the city that offers to house pets. We've been blown away by the need for vet care assistance in the City of Calgary and that took up most of our focus for 2019. However, a month into 2020 and it has become apparent we need to make the Pet Friendly Shelter Project a main focus.

On December 20, 2019 we saw the tragedy of the Valhalla Fire in Bankview where we scrambled to find emergency pet friendly accommodations for the surviving pets and their families. In January a cold snap rolled into Calgary that once again saw us asking the public to open their homes to pets on the street, for survival. We had over 50 individuals that required assistance during that week.

We've recently assisted child services with a 17 year old girl who would not go into a foster home without her pet; she chose to stay on the streets with him. The Mustard Seed, Be The Change YYC, and Alberta Health Services have all made requests for clients this week who have nowhere to go with their pets. This does not even touch on the domestic violence issue in the city and victims wanting to take their pets when they flee the abuse.

Calgary Flames player Mikael Backlund has stepped up to provide awareness to our initiative and has started off our campaign with a generous donation. We'll need to start small, and will most likely rent space to start. A cost analysis into this project has our goal at $30,000 to get the ball rolling and to sustain the program for one year.

We're humbly asking for help in anyway possible. It will take a village to make this happen, but with the support of the community, we're confident that we can establish this service that is so greatly needed in our pet-loving city!

Support the Project

Every fundraiser, every connection, every volunteer helps. If you're interested in helping or even sharing our story and Go Fund Me, we would be extremely grateful!